NATIVE MORALS 199 



course. In the meantime a really bad forest fire had 

 started on our tracks. The grass, thick, tangled, and 

 dry, formed fine fuel, and the fire roared heavenwards 

 like a furnace. I was indeed relieved to find that the 

 two men had run down the depression and reached a 

 khor, which they crossed, and so made their way to 

 camp unscathed. At our halting-place we found a 

 bed of grass and a stick, three feet long, with a dozen 

 or more very tasty fish just roasted on it. We had 

 come on an "abode of love." 



Marriage among natives is a question of £, s. d. 

 The older men have the hoes, &c., of currency, and so 

 buy up the women, who are scarce. While the rains 

 last these are dutiful enough. Once the dry weather 

 begins, away go the bachelors into the pathless jungle, 

 and one fine evening the patriarchs find no supper 

 ready. The young wives have disappeared. Fruit, 

 honey, fish, and game galore make the idyll a perfect 

 one. With the rains the swains return. Of course 

 they know nothing of this girl or that, and are very 

 angry at the accusations of impropriety levelled at 

 them by their elders. Shortly after the young wives 

 return, and are quite brazen. If their condition be 

 interesting, it is sufficient to say that Angrowo or 

 some other sylvan deity has favoured them. Chil- 

 dren, especially girls, are a good speculation, so " Let 

 'em all come," say the elders, as they long for their 

 own young days. 



The Kuru River (called Chell by the Dinkas) runs 

 in a very rocky bed from here to its junction with 

 the equally rocky Biri. The trees on its banks were 



